choose the children in preference to him: the lads he accustomed to
indolence and ruined their souls and bodies by a kind of kindness. As
he still felt afraid in spite of being so placed, he secured some
extra strength for himself in the senate. Those of the populace who
felt friendly towards him he enrolled (to the number of about two
hundred) among the patricians and the senators, and thus he put both
the senate and the people within his own control. He altered his
raiment, likewise, to a more magnificent style. It consisted of toga
and tunic, purple all over and shot with gold, of a crown of precious
stones set in gold, and of ivory sceptre and chair, which were later
used by various officials and especially by those that held sway as
emperors. He also on the occasion of a triumph paraded with a
four-horse chariot and kept twelve lictors for life.

He would certainly have introduced still other and more numerous
innovations, had not Attus Navius prevented him, when he desired to
rearrange the tribes: this man was an augur whose equal has never been
seen. Tarquinius, angry at his opposition, took measures to abase him
and to bring his art into contempt. So, putting into his bosom a
whetstone and a razor, he went among the populace having in his mind
that the whetstone should be cut by the razor,--a thing that is
impossible. He said all that he wished, and when Attus vehemently
opposed him, he said, still yielding not a particle: "If you are not
opposing me out of quarrelsomeness, but are speaking the truth, answer
me in the presence of all these witnesses whether what I have in mind
to do shall be performed." Attus, having taken an augury on almost the
very spot, replied immediately: "Verily, O King, what you intend shall
be fulfilled." "Well, then," said the other, "take this whetstone and
cut it through with this razor; this is what I have had in mind to
come to pass." Attus at once took the stone and cut it through.